


Five of Swords

by emothy



Series: Rewritten [2]
Category: Prince of Tennis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-01-16
Updated: 2007-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-04 05:34:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emothy/pseuds/emothy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Syuusuke sits with the card in his hand, burning the corner. Yuuta sits still and watches quietly, unable to ask where Syuusuke has procured a lighter from, or if he realises Yumiko is going to <i>kill him dead</i> when she finds out one of her tarot cards is missing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five of Swords

**Author's Note:**

> Set right before the Hyotei matches. This won't make much sense unless you know my theories on the Atobe vs. Tezuka match ;)

-

Syuusuke sits with the card in his hand, burning the corner. Yuuta sits still and watches quietly, unable to ask where Syuusuke has procured a lighter from, or if he realises Yumiko is going to _kill him dead_ when she finds out one of her tarot cards is missing.

"She probably already knows," Syuusuke laughs bitterly into the silence, "she can read the future, remember?"

Syuusuke humours his sister to a high degree, they both do, but Yuuta likes to believe he is in control of his own destiny in the end. He doesn't know what his older brother thinks, except that right now he seems to hate that particular tarot card and whatever it means, so he must place some sort of stock in them. It would seem odd, except that when something seems odd for Syuusuke, that's normal.

Yuuta still does not say a word, but he watches Syuusuke's face contort, as though he can hear his younger brother's thoughts. He's like that, sometimes. It creeps Yuuta out, but he brushes it off figuring that he's spent so much time with Syuusuke since they were kids, his brother just knows him really well. If Syuusuke were at all predictable, Yuuta might be able to follow his trains of thought, too.

Syuusuke doesn't speak out to reassure his brother, but if he were to give some kind of explanation, it would go like this: "I just hate to think everything is not in my control. That there could be higher forces out there that know what is going to happen, what is inevitable regardless of the hurdles they put in the way. And they would only do that for fun, if they knew none of the barriers would work anyway."

At one point Yuuta attempts to get up, but a hand stronger than Syuusuke's entire body seems appears on his leg and pins him down.

"Stay here, please." Syuusuke says, and Yuuta just sits in silence long after the card has turned to ash and remnants. He watches Syuusuke out of the corner of his eye, squirming away more and more as he realises he has to pee. But he still can't find it in him to move, until Syuusuke's head slumps against the bed, and his breathing evens out. Yuuta gets up and pulls a blanket off the bed to cover his brother, whose forehead is set with two deep lines.

A hand snakes out and grabs Yuuta's arm again.

"Stay here tonight?" Syuusuke asks, and Yuuta's mouth twists.

"I have to pee." He whispers urgently. Syuusuke for all appearances still seems to be asleep, but he bites his lip.

"Okay." He says eventually. Yuuta frowns.

"I'll come back, though." He says, before he can really think about it. And when it is out, he doesn't regret it as much as he thought he might. He presses his lips to his brother's forehead to try and remove the lines, and they lessen a little, but do not disappear completely.

"Lay on your bed." Yuuta instructs Syuusuke when he returns, lifting him up to his feet rather easily and clutching the blanket to him. His brother follows where he leads, in a daze. Yuuta even has to tuck him in, or else he would just lay there on top of the sheets, catching the cold.

Syuusuke can't help but fall into a proper sleep after that; Yuuta's hand stroking his hair, Yuuta's breath on his neck lightly. He dreams of a ring of fire, five swords inside all pointing inwards to meet one another. When the flames touch them they burn white hot, and eventually, as though they were made of wood or just a magnet to fire, each sword becomes immersed in flames, but not consumed. Syuusuke steps up to the ring of fire and reaches in for a burning sword, stabbing himself in the chest, and discarding it. He can feel blood spilling down his stomach and soaking his shirt, and yet he picks up another sword and stabs himself again, searching for his heart.

There are five swords, and it takes until his fifth try to plunge the weapon into the right place. When he pulls the sword back out his heart is still beating, but it's beating where it is impaled on the blade. The blood is everywhere, on his hands halfway up his elbows, sticking his clothes to his skin. The floor is only red, and the discarded swords still burn, but they seem pink in the contrast of red and white.

Syuusuke looks up and sees Tezuka, watching him with knowing in his eyes. He does not flinch at all as Syuusuke leans forward, blade in hand still, and aims straight into Tezuka's chest. Tezuka grimaces as the sword pierces his heart, and Syuusuke lets go, leaving it stuck in Tezuka's body. He cannot see his tears, but he is sure they're also made of blood.

He appears to wake multiple times during the night, and each time Yuuta tries to murmur words of comfort, never realising they have no effect. Syuusuke curls tighter into himself, clutches at the bedsheets and a wetness develops where the tears fall from the corner of his eyes. When the sunrises he wakes to meet it, looking just as Yuuta feels; like he has spent the entire night awake watching over someone else, and is suffering for his lack of sleep.

It is the day of the Hyotei matches, Yuuta suddenly remembers halfway through breakfast, and wonders what significance that has. Syuusuke has ties with certain schools, but Hyotei is not one of them, could it possibly have any importance if that was the case?

He watches his brother as intently as he watches the Singles One match, eyes flickering between the two views. He sees the way Hyotei's captain has been watching his brother all throughout every other match, including Syuusuke's own, but now that his match is on, he does not seem to dare. Tezuka never looks anywhere else but his match, but that is normal for Seigaku's captain. His brother can't seem to decide where is best to look; at Tezuka, at Atobe, or at the floor.

He remembers back to sneaking into Yumiko's room in the morning while Syuusuke showered and showered and showered, trying to remember what little he had seen of the card his brother had been burning to nothingness. When he finds the Five Of Swords, he stops. It's not exactly the same, but he knows vaguely that all decks are drawn slightly differently, and the symbolism is the important part. The lessons his sister tried to teach him.

One word still stands out in his mind as he watches the captains battle it out. Treachery. He can't see how it relates, but the feeling radiates from Syuusuke as he wraps arms tighter around himself as though looking for a comfort.

"Everything's going _wrong_," Syuusuke says in despair, voice barely making contact with the air, but Yuuta hears it. And that is when he looks twice and wonders what situation his brother has managed to engineer now, and why he is so afraid of its outcome.

-


End file.
